Opuntia

I love the strongly architectural look of the rounded paddles of prickly pear, especially when a nice mound is tucked in among other plants, peeking out from between them or in back of some lower plants.

They add such a distinctive form and contrast.

But the spines . . 

← This is cacanapa ellisiana, a spineless opuntia. It's a smaller version at only 3 feet high, but it can spread out to about 6 feet.

Many opuntias are very winter hardy, such as the Opuntia humifusa that is native to New England and all the way up into Canada, but this spineless one is a zone 7 plant.

I could grow this opuntia here. My garden is now in zone 7. 

There is an interesting prickly pear in a neighborhood front yard around the corner. My photo was in too much sunlight, but you can see the interesting balance of stone surround and spreading opuntia

But where would I put one? I tried to imagine one in my yard, either in back or out front, but couldn't settle on a good spot for it. Planted on its own as a specimen, it isn't as interesting as it is tucked in with other plants.

I could plant one in combination with the cholla out front, with the fernbush and butterfly bush. This shot shows how it looks with other things, including a cholla.

But I probably won't. I like the half circle of what is there now -- the cholla, the fernbush and the butterfly bush. 

Where I might consider planting several would be in the common area by the driveway, where I lost all the gambel oaks I was nurturing. Mingled among the wild grasses, the paddles would contrast with the airy grass forms and in dry years when the grasses decline, the opuntia would be something to look at.

I had Opuntia humifusa in Connecticut. It was still a small plant when it succumbed after a couple years to winter wet or too much summer rain, I forget which, but it went. 

It looked great in summer but a mess in winter. I loved it until I didn't.

But I love how prickly pear looks here in Santa Fe, although it's usually planted as a specimen in the gravel by itself. I like it better mixed in with other plants.

Or even in this more woodland setting highlighted in front of the barn but with other plants and even trees around. A nice combination of structure and softness.

I keep coming back to pictures of the spineless cacanapa ellisiana and I think I want to try getting a few going in the gassy - weedy open area next to the garage.

Some Autumn Views

After all the rain this fall, late autumn has settled in to pleasant dry weather. Mornings flirt with the low 30s but the days are warm and sunny. Normally I would have brought the pots into the garage and cut back some things by now, but it's been too nice and there is no hard freeze forecast yet.

One of the more successful things I've done is to convert the garden under the aspens into a more woodland / shrub planting, and the redtwig dogwoods I planted have done really well.

They have grown fast in just three years. In summer they are just a quiet filler below the aspens, but of course the red stems are the show.

They pick up the red from the chairs on the deck when I look out from the kitchen window as I make coffee in the morning. It's a nice sight.

Infiltration

I follow a Denver blogger and recently he posted something interesting: 

Read the full post here. The gist of it, paraphrased is: 

People are constantly saying to mulch with organic matter to conserve soil moisture, well, the soil has to be moist in the first place. In a region where it doesn’t rain all day and all night, but just for a couple of hours, organic matter impedes infiltration.

Rock is the answer, just like in real life where these plants grow. The rocks let the rain infiltrate down to the soil.

So add rocks to any little area where smaller plants like agastaches and salvias are growing to kind of mimic reality. Not more compost.

from The Miserable Gardener

That explains a lot. 

My own observations have consistently frustrated me that all my nice added compost turns hard and clumps under the damp wood mulch, and water doesn't seem to penetrate very far down, no matter how much I irrigate or hose water.

He explains just what I have been seeing. I need infiltration -- rocks -- spread around plants to help brief but deep watering to move, rather than sit pooled just under the wood chips.

It should be small sized pea gravel, not mixed into the soil, just at the surface. 

I now have an installation project to do this winter.

Hydrology Dynamics

Since mid September we've had so much rain, and another inch and half yesterday. It came down hard, it hailed with vengeance, and an icy white coating stuck. (See note at the end of this post)

The kitchen flooded despite the water dam I put at the door sill. It flooded badly. The rug is soaked and there is water under the refrigerator that the mop can't reach.

This much rain is highly unusual, but I wonder if we changed the water dynamics when we put up the new door canopy.

The original canvas one made water flow out in front of the door and then down straight to the French drain at the door sill. The new one we installed directs water to each side, and maybe the drain can't handle that? Hard to say.

Or maybe I altered the hydrology when I took out so many potato sized rocks to plant in the courtyard garden. 

The rocks went down deeply and puzzled me, but they may have been installed there as a catchment for water flow. 

I would think all the plants and soil there now would help absorb runoff, but maybe not.

Or maybe it's just an incredible amount of rain coupled with the problematic slope of the flagstones from the gate toward the kitchen door. 

The dropoff down to the door is pretty visible right at the drain, but the gentle downward tilt starts from the gate, so there's a lot of water coming down from the driveway plus all that falls from the door canopy and from the canale right over the rose in the corner.

Too much rain, questionable structure elements, and backwards hardscape.

* The storm was strong, including a very rare occurrence: tornadoes in Santa Fe. Reports and photos showed severe tornado damage, torn off roofs and collapsed structures in a downtown neighborhood. Ten houses were damaged, no one was hurt thankfully. The neighborhood is just a couple miles from us, but we had no touch downs here, no real damage beyond leaves and twigs and smushed plants. And a wet kitchen.

A Bit of Color

The Virginia creeper has turned its godawful ratty brown now and it's what we see from the patio and from inside the house. It goes suddenly and early every year, but this year's hot dry summer stressed it with powdery mildew all over. I'll ignore it. I have to.

The crabapple did not color this fall, it's just dropping its leaves. There are no red crabs at all. It flowered only sparsely, just a few blooms this spring, but they did not fruit.

The serviceberry, however, is starting to color up nicely and even has a delicate glow to its changing leaves. A nice sight right out the kitchen door.

I'm pleased with how it transplanted last winter. It seems to be doing well and I can see a day in the far future when it will shade the kitchen door from the bright morning sun in summer and we won't have to keep the blinds shut tight in the mornings.

The cottonwood and the aspens aren't really turning yellow very much. But the redbud is. It's starting to turn a nice lemon yellow.

It tilts out away from the garage. Redbuds naturally lean out from the forest's edge and look graceful in the transition from shaded woods to open sunlight, but as a single specimen in a tight yard, it looks unbalanced.

But I am happy it is finally healthy enough and growing, with a nice leader after all these years.

Not much else looks very colorful this fall. The Japanese maple is starting to turn a brownish red, it's early yet. It typically colors up spectacular in November. 

We got one night in the 20s recently and the maple's leaves look brown at the edges. So there may not be much red this year.

The plumbagos are a nice red though.

And this tiny Coral Reef sedum, tucked in among the moss rocks in the circle garden is a sweet little pop of red to brighten things at ground level.

I'd like to get a few more of this small spreader to add along the rock border. It's sedum tetractinum, called Chinese sedum.

(Note: Sooner Plant Farm has it.)

 

Little Surprises

Beautiful cool fall morning. I found a few surprises in the garden today.

The Venosa violacae clematis that had died all the way back to the ground this summer has regenerated. There is new fresh growth and even a stem arching out with more leaf buds. I had cut the dried stems all the way back and planned to take out the rootball and replace this vine with a Jackamnii clematis.

But here it is, regrowing in October.

The Lacey Blue dwarf Russian sages gave me a pleasant surprise -- the new one gallon plant from Monrovia came and it is full and thick and is now planted in the new garden by the fence. It's lovely. 

And then I discovered that the 4 inch pot of Lacey Blue I got from High Country Gardens that came with all its foliage torn off has survived. I wrote it off for a loss (and got a refund), but forgot about it for 10 days and left the little pot on the potting bench, neglected and unwatered. Today I saw tiny new leaves.

If I can get it to survive and grow I'll find a spot for it next spring. The one I have now next to the urn is nice. The flowers are going by and fading, but it still peeks out from around the rim of the pot. Next year I need to trim it back to keep it from splaying too much.

Another surprise is that the Jupiter's Beard is reblooming now in mid October. It's shaggy looking but eye catching viewed from the patio. 

It reseeds with vigor (the plant itself is short lived) and I am finding tons of little seedlings popping up under it and all around that section of the garden.

I was pleasantly surprised to see the new Black Adder agastache I got from High Country Gardens has recovered. 

I repotted it in a bigger container but it struggled and looked half dead for a while. It's doing well now. The older one in the ground by the birdbath died back but has basal growth showing.

I like my vision for the new strip under the fence. The Virginia creeper vine is a brown mess already and the plants need to bulk up and the agastache needs to recover next year but the whole look has promise. 

The lambsear at the left looks particularly good since it rained.

You can see how the wind patterns tilt the new thin plants over, especially the tall Appar Blue flax. The fence and deck and layout of our narrow garden channel the breezes one way apparently.

It's mid October, with Halloween coming up now. But an odd one with such a stressful summer and then so much rain in September. But there is some color starting and leaves are thinning out. 

I'm surprised I actually like the view toward the back fence now without the honeysuckle vine there. 

A nice time of year.

   🍂

Mock Orange

For five years I have looked out the dining room window and thought - boy, when the mock orange attains its mature size it will be too big here. I keep imaging the 5 foot tall and wide shrub in that spot near the rain barrel and I suspected it would be too much.

After five years this is what I have:

Mine after 5 years, and  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . what it should look like in bloom

Mine has never bloomed. It dies back to the ground each winter and then regrows from the roots. Because mock orange blooms on old wood and none of the woody stem structure is retained, I don't get any flowers. What does grow each season is healthy foliage, but the new stems are just slender whips.

It is a 'Cheyenne' philadelphus that is native, tough as nails, easy to grow and needs no care. Mine is not able to compete with the juniper and cottonwood roots apparently, or it's in too much shade much of the day or both.

I need to move it. And replace it. There is irrigation there under the dining room window. Despite being on the east side, the site is in deep morning shade from the cottonwood, then sun later. 

I've had good results so far with redtwig dogwoods in shade competing under trees, so I ended up putting another one there. 

No flowering to speak of, no fragrance, but some fall color to complement the Japanese maple and some visual weight for the spot. Red stems will echo the rain barrel in winter. The barrel overflows at times and the redtwig dogwood tolerates flooding.

And the mock orange? I took it out, did not replant it anywhere. It's gone.

Missing Russian Sage

The sun has been out for two days now, following weeks of rain and cool temperatures. Skies are bluebird blue and the days are lovely. Everything is still so wet. 

My High Country Garden order came and I planted it up.

What a difference to dig in soil that was damp all the way down. Not soggy, but very moist and soft. Usually I have to dig a shallow hole in either powder or cement!

I planted two Engelmann's daisies close together in the circle garden, two scarlet monardellas in the green trough, a Black Adder agastache in a pot for winter (final location to be determined next spring), and a dwarf Lacey Blue Russian sage in the circle garden by the Mexican sage.

But alas, only one of the Lacey Blue Russian sages was alive, the second one did not survive shipping. They don't have a replacement so I'll get a refund.

It was supposed to go in the strip by the fence. That new area, created last winter, is still missing plants.

The missing:

The Black Adder agastache died down to the ground in the high heat and drought of this past summer, although I watered it a lot. The roots live, I can see basal growth at soil level. I'll see if it comes back in spring. I do have the second one I just got.

🪏 If it doesn't come back and if I decide to leave the new Black Adder in a container for my prairie pot garden instead, maybe plant out the yellow tickseed there?

The Russian sage was supposed to go next to the Windwalker Red salvia (which is doing well). I ended up getting a replacement from Monrovia -- a big one gallon this time.

🪏 It won't arrive until mid October. Too late to plant?